Africana Studies (AFST) 1
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Africana Studies (AFST) 1 AFRICANA STUDIES (AFST) Faculty Professor: P. Khalil Saucier (Director) Assistant Professors: Beeta Baghoolizadeh, Nicholas Brady, Jaye Austin Williams Affiliated Faculty: Nina E. Banks (Economics), Paul Barba (History), Adam Burgos (Philosophy), Raphael Dalleo (English), Cymone Fourshey (History, International Relations), Michelle C. Johnson (Anthropology), Meenakshi Ponnuswami (English), Jessica Pouchet (Environmental Studies & Sciences), Anthony F. Stewart (English), T. Joel Wade (Psychology), Carol Wayne White (Religious Studies), Thelathia Nikotris Young (Women's & Gender Studies) Africana Studies is devoted to the critical examination of the artistic, historical, literary and theoretical developments of the global black experience. As a discipline, Africana Studies explores racial blackness and its relationship to the making of the modern world. It is a discipline that continues to grow out of the black freedom struggle and is therefore committed to rigorous scholarship and community development and responsibility grounded in the histories and lived experience of people of African descent. Africana Studies offers majors an interdisciplinary curriculum that engages both historical and contemporary issues from a liberal arts perspective. It allows students to ask questions about the production of knowledge and the world around them, while developing critical analytical skills. Majors will develop an understanding of the vital issues, questions and debates driving theory and research in the discipline through written and oral discourse. Africana Studies provides students significant preparation for careers in education, social work, public policy, law, community development, medicine, international affairs, academia and much more. Africana Studies majors must complete nine courses from the following categories, including an independent study, the object of which is to complete a thesis, which will fulfill the Culminating Experience. Courses must be selected in consultation with a departmental adviser. Africana Studies Major Requirements (9 courses) AFST 199 Introduction to Africana Studies 1 AFST 250 Approaches to Africana Studies 1 One course in History (Africa, African American, or Caribbean) 1 Five courses in area specialties: Social Sciences, Humanities, and Arts; of these courses, two must be at the 200 level, and at least one course 5 must be at the 300 level. AFST 399 Independent Study 1 Courses in area specialties are distributed both divisionally and geographically. Students must take the following number of courses out of the approved list of Africana divisional courses: two in social sciences, two in humanities, and one in the arts. These courses must include the following geographic groupings: one course on Africa, one course on African America, and one course on either the Caribbean or Afro-Latin communities. Courses may count simultaneously for the division and region/spatial community requirements. (As such, a single course may fulfill both a humanities and an Africa requirement.) Students will fulfill the Culminating Experience by completion of a thesis in an area of Africana Studies. Students will register for an independent study in the fall of their senior year with their faculty adviser. The thesis topic must be confirmed in writing in consultation with the faculty adviser by the end of each student’s junior year. [See Honors Council website for consideration as an honors thesis; however, theses do not have to be submitted to the Honors Council to count as the Culminating Experience major requirement for Africana Studies.] Faculty advisers will determine successful completion of the thesis/Culminating Experience requirement by submission of the grade for the independent study. Africana Studies majors will become competent writers through their engagement with the wide array of writing tasks required in our courses. Public speaking instruction will occur as a facet of the oral presentation assignments in many of our courses, but specifically required in our two core classes. Through the research skills acquired in our foundational classes (the classes that constitute the major), students will gain information literacy and will be required to demonstrate that literacy through completion of a thesis in their senior year. **For a current list of courses that contribute to the Africana Studies Program, please visit the Africana Studies webpage at www.bucknell.edu/ africanastudies (https://www.bucknell.edu/academics/college-arts-sciences/academic-departments-programs/africana-studies/? utm_source=news&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=pr). Students majoring in Africana Studies are strongly encouraged to spend a semester or a summer abroad, preferably in Africa or the Caribbean. Bucknell in Ghana is particularly encouraged. Africana Studies Minor Africana Studies is the study of the interrelated histories, politics and cultural products of Africa and the African Diaspora in the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe and elsewhere. As a field of inquiry, Africana Studies critically examines the intellectual traditions and experiences 2 Africana Studies (AFST) of Africans and diasporic communities from intra- and interdisciplinary perspectives. Africana Studies minors must complete a minimum of five courses. Africana Studies Minor Core Requirements (2 classes) AFST 199 Introduction to Africana Studies 1 AFST 250 Approaches to Africana Studies 1 Three additional courses from the following list: AFST 201 Introduction to Black Performance 1 AFST 220 Race, Riots and Resistance 1 AFST 221 Introduction to African American Literature 1 AFST 222 Caribbean Literature 1 AFST 223 Questioning the Post-Racial 1 AFST 227 Race and Sexuality 1 AFST 229 Philosophy and Race 1 AFST 230 Black Radical Politics 1 AFST 235 Black Radical Thought & Art – Multi-disciplinarily Considered 1 AFST 248 Music and Culture: Jazz and Social Justice 1 AFST 250 Approaches to Africana Studies 1 AFST 255 Radical Black Drama and Performance 1 AFST 257 Music and Culture: Jazz, Rock, and Race 1 AFST 263 Conservation in Africa 1 AFST 265 (Really) Reading Black Plays 1 AFST 266 Black Africans in the Hispanic Black Atlantic: Then and Now 1 AFST 268 Migrations: Africa to America and the (Re)Making of Culture 1 AFST 271 Politics of Anti-Blackness 1 AFST 274 Africa and International Relations in Historical Perspective 1 AFST 278 Photographing Race 1 AFST 280 Race, Violence & Incarceration 1 AFST 285 Performing Slavery 1 AFST 290 Topics in Africana Studies 1 AFST 291 Africa: Ancient to Early Modern Times 4000BCE-1400CE 1 AFST 292 Making Contemporary Africa: 'Early Modern' to the 'Post-Modern' World - 1400 to the Present 1 AFST 293 Ancestors and Androids: African Religions in a Global Era 1 AFST 295 Hip-Hop and Blackness 1 AFST 302 Contemporary Africa & Colonial Pasts: Investments and Re-Emergences 1 AFST 310 Racial Capitalism 1 AFST 315 Race, Sports, and Rebellion 1 AFST 319 African-American History 1 AFST 322 Haiti and the American Imagination 1 AFST 399 Independent Study 1 Other courses may be selected in consultation with program director. Africana Studies often stands in critical relation to other disciplines and fields of knowledge for the ways in which blackness and the black experience is primary, rather than secondary, if at all, to the critical exploration and engagement of this world. Africana Studies utilizes multi- and interdisciplinary approaches, methods, and theories to illustrate the primacy of blackness and the global black experience. Despite the complexity, enormity, and diversity of the Africana world, several learning objectives unify our teaching in Africana Studies at Bucknell University. Students graduating with a major in Africana Studies will be able to: • demonstrate an understanding of the historical development of Africana Studies as a long-standing and exciting field of knowledge and inquiry; • identify the important contributors to the field, and explain the relevance of the field for both the academy and community; Africana Studies (AFST) 3 • demonstrate an understanding of the historical dimensions of the Black experience as well as the cultural, social, political, and economic forces that have helped shape these experiences; • demonstrate an understanding of the major approaches and methodologies of Africana Studies; • apply appropriate theories and methodologies for understanding the global Black experience; • demonstrate a command for a specific body of knowledge within the field of Africana Studies. Courses AFST 199. Introduction to Africana Studies. 1 Credit. Offered Either Fall or Spring; Lecture hours:4 The course introduces students to concepts, theories, and debates of the vibrant discipline of Africana Studies. It surveys major themes, questions, concerns, and events of African, African American, and other African diasporic communities. The course examines the making of the modern world through the lens of black global experience. AFST 201. Introduction to Black Performance. 1 Credit. Offered Either Fall or Spring; Lecture hours:3 This course will introduce students to the field of performance theory as it is engaged through the lens of the Black World. It will place scholars in Black performance theory in conversation with scholars working in the black radical tradition whose work raises important questions about performance, blackness, and more. AFST 213. Race in Historical and Comparative Perspectives. 1 Credit. Offered Either Fall or Spring; Lecture hours:3 Explores the evolution of the